Speaking of burqas...

“Rub-a-dub-dub”
The Tale of the Tub
by Bachchoo

Col. Muammar Gaddafi, appealing to his population to fight the Western coalition’s decision to stop his troops from killing the rebels in his land, played the Islamic card. His speeches called their action a modern Christian Crusade against Islam.

Col. Gaddafi is not known as the most pious of Muslims. Neither was Saddam Hussein, or for that matter, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. But then that’s politics!
I don’t know what Col. Gaddafi does in his tent. He may piously pray five times a day, refrain from drinks and stick to halal food, but I do read in the press that his sons have — how shall one put this? — tastes and pastimes which can’t be characterised as strictly Islamic. These pastimes are well publicised — shooting, yachting and clubbing with financiers and supporters of Israel. I couldn’t care less, but what would Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad say?
Col. Gaddafi’s daughter Aisha recently appeared on TV. She had covered her head, but wasn’t in full burqa. I have never seen or heard a public speech by a person in full burqa and would, I admit, be interested to. I have, so far, found that the expression and facial rhetoric of orators and speakers convey to me very much of the intent and meaning of their words.
Look, for instance, at footage of Hitler and the sly, ducking expression between tirades. The burkhaed rhetorician would be to me like Big Sister making pronouncements. I don’t suppose looking for a website of the Iranian Parliament will satisfy my curiosity by offering me a speaker in such full array. I suppose they have women in their Parliament but I don’t know how they are dressed — though one does hear of what happens at secret Tehran parties.
This is the week in which the French police have been called upon to act on the new French anti-burqa law. It’s not a law that common sense should support.
Obviously a gang of men entering a bank wearing balaclavas and robes which could conceal machine-guns should be immediately challenged by the local constabulary. For the same reasons the anti-burqa law should only be applied in parallel or identical circumstances: three burqa-nasheens urgently entering a bank with a getaway car driven by another hidden one waiting a few feet away at the curb? I don’t think so. Send for Inspector Poirot!
But in general, burqas, hijabs and niqabs should not be the business of the state. Personally, I operate the Groucho Marx principle which states that he wouldn’t want to belong to any club that would accept him as a member. Similarly, I don’t wish to see the face of anyone who, for some religious belief, doesn’t want to show it to me. I really can do without.
I am, though, fascinated to know what fundamentalist Islamic girls’ schools do for group photographs. Does the photo of the Class of 2010 and 2009 all row after sitting and standing row in their black burqas look exactly like the class of 2011? Are they all smiling when the photographer says “say ‘cheese’?” Perhaps we shall never know.
Very many Muslim societies and millions of Muslims, including some very learned and respected ones, don’t accept that Islam enjoins women to be covered from head to foot. Nevertheless what people wear in the land of liberty, equality and fraternity is, with notable exceptions such as the balaclava in the bank or the birthday suit in the High Street, none of France President Nicolas Sarkozy’s business.
Neither is what Col. Gaddafi chooses to wear any of mine. I am free to wonder why he wants to look like a circus clown parodying a Ruritanian general with medals which look like they were bought wholesale from Mumbai’s or Marrakech’s chor bazaar? It certainly isn’t a form of dress sanctioned by Islam, so perhaps he is following Idi Amin’s tasteful example?
Apart from the bad taste, he also behaves badly in public.
In the late 1980s, working in British TV, I sent a crew down to Zimbabwe to cover the Commonwealth conference and get an interview with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Robert Mugabe, who was not then known as a murdering swine or usurper, had invited as a special guest to the conference his friend Col. Gaddafi.
Darcus Howe (Trinidadian British and a writer and broadcaster by profession), the producer and interviewer of my TV crew, told me the story. The delegates were assembled in a public hall. The traffic in Harare had been strictly restricted with police and Army roadblocks in control. The rule was that no armaments should be allowed past the roadblocks and into the hall.
Col. Gaddafi arrived, dressed in his clown’s outfit, with a large contingent of female soldiers carrying machine guns and other weapons. The Zimbabwean police stopped them and there was an argument and a consequent delay to the proceedings. Col. Gaddafi wasn’t personally stopped and he entered the hall to applause, got onto the stage, was welcomed and looked a bit disconcerted.
One of his male generals came hurrying down the aisle and climbed onto the stage and was immediately berated in Arabic by the good Colonel. Where the hell were his female bodyguards? He had arranged and expected to make an entrance into this congregation flanked by them! The general muttered his excuse. They had been detained by the Zimbabweans.
In front of that international delegation, Col. Gaddafi slapped with an open palm and shouted at him. The flunkey general slunk off holding his smarting cheek.
In a few minutes the female Libyan bodyguards walked into the hall carrying their sub-machine guns and rallying in pantomime array to flank their leader. Mr Mugabe’s police had been induced somehow to change their minds and make an exception for the Libyan delegation.
Darcus subsequently interviewed Rajiv. The interview ranged over very many topics and when they were off camera Rajiv chatted with Darcus who asked him what he thought of Col. Gaddafi and the previous day’s performance.
“He’s mad isn’t he?” was Rajiv’s response.